Sunday, 30 March 2014

With the clocks going forward an hour in the wee hours of the morning, I've lost an hour needed for putting these Serendipity Sunday posts together, and now I feel all flustered trying to get this post finished before I fall asleep (as you guys are waking up). Yep, I still can't sleep at night like a normal person. Thanks, pain.

I actually started putting this post together on Friday this week, but I've still found it eating away at quite a few hours of the weekend. You'd be surprised how long it can take to organise one of these posts! I think I over think what to add far too much and have too many options to choose from! Thankfully, it's almost finished now, and it looks like it will be reaching you on time. Phew! I hope you enjoy this week's selection.

If it wasn't official before, it is now: I'm obsessed with Sasha Unisex's artwork! She shared this stunning collection of watercolour tattoo art on her Instagram this week. These are all paintings that were turned in to tattoos for her customers.

Saturday, 29 March 2014

Part one of the tour focused on all the pretty trinkets displayed on the dressing table and you can catch up with part one here. Today I'm going to show you how I store my make up.

So, who would like a peek in to my drawers?

My dressing table has three small drawers down one side. Two drawers hold my make up, and the third holds my nail polish collection. Let's take a look!

The top drawer is kept organised by a wooden cutlery tray which I bought in Cargo over a year and a half ago. Cutlery drawers make fantastic make up organisers, and often look much nicer than cheap plastic dividers. They're a lot cheaper, too. This one cost me £8.

On the left are my lip products. I don't have a huge collection of lippy, but I'm gradually building it up. The other three sections, from the back, contain my blushers, mascaras, and base products. In the gaps around the tray are a few lipgloss and lipstick sets, some nail files, and an epilator I haven't used in forever. I love how colourful this drawer is.

Up until a few months ago all my make up had been stored in one drawer- and I miraculously managed to keep it organised. Now I'm looking at these photos and wondering how I did it! I had to expand it to a second drawer at Christmas when I gained several new make up sets and even now it's cramped.

The second drawer is home to my eye make up collection. Most of the palettes are eye make up sets, but there's also a couple of face powder palettes that are too big for the first drawer. I also keep some cleansing wipes, and a mirror to do my make up with in this drawer.

Last week, I got fed up of the disarray and made these dividers out of a sturdy cardboard box that once held chocolates. The box was square, so I cut a section of the lid off to size, and sellotaped it to the end of the square to make a rectangle. I wanted it to fit the length of the drawer to make the best use of the space. I then took another piece of the lid and sellotaped it to the middle of the square to divide it in to two.

I now have an organised make up collection and it didn't cost me a penny! This will probably just be a temporary storage solution until I can purchase another cutlery drawer or drawer tidy, but it's sure worked a treat at keeping my make up tidy!

The front section is home to my liquid and pencil eye liners. The middle and back sections hold my powder eyeshadows, most of which are singles, but there are a few duos and palettes in there, two. Along side the divider are several Inglot, Stila, and Soap and Glory palettes.

I'm addicted to green eye make up, which I'm sure you can tell from the photos, and I love good quality make up products. My favourite make up brand has got to be Inglot, but I like and use both drug store and high end make up brands.

My favourite products are still my gorgeous Inglot eyeshadow palettes. The colours are highly pigmented and I have a rainbow of pretty colours to play with.

And finally, the bottom drawer is home to my nail polish collection, nail art pens, and tools.

I have quite a large collection of polishes; the last time I counted I had more than 110! Oops. I think I may have a nail polish addiction!

I try to keep my nail polishes organised by colour, glitter, and effects, as it makes it easier to locate a particular bottle. This is less organised than it usually is. I need to take it all out, go through them all, throw out the ones which have dried up, and give them a tidy.

The purple pot holds my tools such as a glass nail file, dotting tools, tweezers, manicure scissors and so on. The cupcake is a little manicure set I was given for Christmas.

The drawer isn't the most ideal way of storing my nail polish collection, as it's so easy to forgot about particular colours when they're stored away. I want to get a little display cabinet to hang on the wall above my dressing table where I can display some of my favourites and remind myself to use them, but in the mean time the drawer is more than adequate for keeping them all neat and tidy.

Thursday, 27 March 2014

I finally feel like my dressing table is coming together, so I thought it was time I gave you a dressing table tour!

There's a lot to show you, so I'm splitting the tour in to three posts to break the length down a bit. Today I'm going to show you what's displayed on the table top and surrounding walls. I should warn you that this post is photo-heavy and a bit of a long one.

It's been about a year and a half since I last did one of these posts, and it's fair to say it's changed quite a bit since then. I still have my ugly, old, rectangular, pine-look dressing table and mirrors which I've had since my early teens. I hate the appearance of the thing, but it serves its purpose and I'm not in the position to afford new furniture right now so I just make do. I'm thankful I have one, but I can't wait for the day when I can get myself a beautiful ornate white or cream vanity with an oval mirror, and heaps of storage.

This is how my dressing table currently looks, cluttered with trinkets and cosmetics. It's squeezed in to one of the alcoves in my bedroom. There's a window just to the right of the shot, and my bed is just in front of it. As I'm currently stuck living with my parents, my bedroom is pretty crammed with my possessions, and I don't have enough floor space left to be able to sit in front of the dressing table on a stool. There's about a foot gap between the table and my bed, so I just sit on the bed. I have to pretty much side step around the bed to get to it! It isn't ideal, but everything is easily within reach and I'm pleased with the way it's coming together. I'd usually keep the mirror in the centre for symmetry, but I've had to angle it in a way that doesn't catch my reflection while I'm in bed. If I see a pair of eyes looking at me while I'm half asleep, I'd give myself a heart attack!

The left hand side of the surface is currently very cluttered with most of my lotions and potions. The plan was just to keep cosmetics in the cake stand on display, but that soon went out of the window! I bought the cake stand last year from Homebase, (pink version available here), because it complimented my jewellery stands, and I thought it would be a great way to utilise my limited space. I was right! Tiered stands are invaluable if you're very tight on counter and storage space, and they look pretty, too.

The cake stand is home to my lotions, body sprays, cleansers, and travel sized toiletries.

The glass jar holds my cotton wool pads. I found it in Hobby Craft a couple of months ago and it was only £2.99! They stock the jars in a few sizes and I think this one is the smallest.

I've had the jewellery mannequin for years. It did have a stand until last year when my mother accidentally broke it whilst redecorating for me. Thankfully it doesn't look too bad without its legs because I love it. I bought it from a local store.

Along the mirror and to the right hand side of the dressing table are all my pretty trinkets.

The heart shaped stand is an earring holder, although it doesn't hold many earrings at the moment because I don't own all that many dangly ones. I'm planning to just fill it gradually as I collect them. The stand came from ASOS the Christmas before last, and I snapped it up on sale for next to nothing.

I love the hearts in the base.

The butterfly tea light holders are my latest additions. I found them in a garden centre for £1.49 each. I bought two. The candle inside this one is a baby-powder scented Yankee. It smells just like talcum powder! The scent is amazing.

My make up brushes are some of my favourite things on display. The handles are coated in glitter, gems, and beads, like those beautiful Middle Eastern trinket pots. I've had the brushes for seven or eight years now, and the glitter has faded some what, but they're still so pretty. I bought them from B Never Too Busy To Be Beautiful, Lush's late sister company who sold make up and cosmetics. Unfortunately they went in to administration a few years ago. The brushes are vegan, and like most good-quality make up brushes, they cost a small fortune. Luckily, my little sister worked at Lush at the time so her discount made everything far more affordable. Let's just say her discount got abused a lot.

Hello, reflection me! Oh, the concentration!

I don't have a large perfume collection, mainly because I get overwhelmed by perfume shopping and like to stick with what I know and love. And that's fruity-scented perfumes like Escada and the DKNY Delicious scents.

Along the top of the mirrors I've draped white fairy lights which I decided to keep up after Christmas. I love the ambiance of the soft lighting when it's dark and I'm curled up with a good book. I've also displayed my Alice bands along the mirrors, which is a great way to save drawer space.

I also have a masquerade mask in the corner. It reminds me of the Masquerade ball in Phantom of the Opera, which is one of my favourite musicals and films. The mask was actually marketed as a Christmas decoration but I bought it especially for my dressing table.

The rose is a corsage that I clipped in to the feathers because I loved the contrast of colours.

My Dad finally got around to putting my jewellery hooks on the wall for me last week! I'd only been waiting fifteen months... Our walls are ridiculously difficult to drill in to, so I needed a strong pair of hands to help.

This set of hooks was another Hobby Craft find last year, and I think they cost me just £2.99! I wish I'd picked up a couple more because it looks lovely against the sky blue walls. I would love to get some for my belts, scarves, and bags, but I don't know if they still stock them. This one holds a random selection of my necklaces.

My Dad also hung this jewellery hanger up for me, which sits above the cake stand. I bought it through ASOS in Christmas 2012 when it was on sale for about a fiver. It has hooks for earrings, bracelets, and necklaces although the earring loops are currently very lonely.

I have most of my pendant necklaces hanging from this stand. Unsurprisingly, most of my necklaces are novelty designs. I'm pretty sure you'll have noticed my addiction to novelty accessories by now!

I hung a selection of my prettiest bracelets from the bracelet hooks, although this is only some of my collection. You'll be seeing more of them another day! I have a soft spot for pearls and charm bracelets.

I still have a big gap on the wall above the dressing table, which I'm planning to fill with one of these display cabinets:

I can't decide which design I like best, but they'd both be perfect for displaying some of my nail polish collection. They're far prettier than those cheap acrylic stands. I've been lusting after these two for over a year, and I hope to purchase one in the not too distant future. They're both from Dot Com Gift Shop and you can find the sweetheart display cabinet here, and the dolls house display cabinet here.

And that's my dressing table from the counter up. If you've made it this far, thanks for sticking with me! I got a little carried away.

I'll be back soon with the second part of the tour, where I'll be giving you a peek at my make up storage!